


The Gaston Appendices

by plantyourarchivewithme



Category: Beauty and the Beast (2017)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-14
Updated: 2017-06-14
Packaged: 2019-09-28 22:15:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17191289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plantyourarchivewithme/pseuds/plantyourarchivewithme
Summary: A series of essays concerning the finer, often overlooked details of the "Beauty and the Beast (2017)" universe.





	1. The Socioeconomic Toll of Gaston's Diety Habits

**Author's Note:**

> [Originally posted on my Tumblr.](https://gastvn.tumblr.com/tagged/the-gaston-appendices)

We all know that every morning, Gaston eats five dozen eggs - so he's "roughly the size of a barge!" - but has anyone stopped to consider the effect that his mass protein consumption would have on Villeneuve's economy?

The producers of 2017's "Beauty and the Beast" reboot made it quite clear that despite all of the changes they made, Gaston still ate sixty eggs a day[1] \- that's four hundred and twenty eggs a week. It's one of the only unchanged lyrics in the song "Gaston," in fact[2]; Gaston clearly declares to the entire tavern that he's a ridiculously buff "man among men" who is fueled by the power of eggs. That's canon forever. The source of Gaston's daily eggs-tragavanza is left a mystery, however, and is open to interpretation - but I'm going to dissect it right now.

If Gaston lived on a farm and owned his own chickens, this would be less of a problem - I myself have written a few ficlets[3] where he and LeFou live on a farm with several children, but that's _fanfiction_ , not canon. To consume sixty eggs a day, this helpful Reddit article says that Gaston would need to own _at least_ one hundred and forty chickens (that each produce three or more eggs a week)[4]. That's kind of crazy.

Both the 1991 and 2017 versions of "Beauty and the Beast," however, clearly depict him as a hunter whose primary income comes from his game. It's very likely that Gaston did _not_ live on a farm, as farming is extremely time-consuming (especially in the eighteenth century, before handy things like tractors and combines existed) and difficult, and is literally a job of its own. There's no way he would be able to be a farmer _and_ a hunter - unless he somehow had access to a Time Turner or something.

One could argue that it's possible to own chickens without living on a farm - and yes, of course it is! But the sheer amount of space it would take to house one hundred and forty chickens is insane (and sadly, most people don't really let their chickens roost inside their homes). Basically, to even attempt to manage over a hundred chickens, you would have to live on a farm - or at least have a very large backyard.

So we've established that Gaston didn't live on a farm or own chickens (I mean, maybe he had one or two of his own, but he still couldn't get the stupendously large number of eggs he required for his muscle-building from just a few birds. The Reddit article goes more in depth about how many eggs chickens produced back in eighteenth century France, but it's much less than the modern chicken production rates). Where exactly did he get all of his eggs from, then?

Villeneuve's market, of course! Which he absolutely ruined.

The root of capitalism is supply and demand: when a desirable product is in short supply, the price increases, and vice versa. While eighteenth century France revolved around mercantalism[5], the basic principles of its economy were still the same. However, after the Seven Years' War (which is the war that Gaston and LeFou most likely fought in), the French economy followed a steep decline - especially after 1775[6]. In a deleted scene of 2017's "Beauty and the Beast," LeFou says that it's been "twelve years since the war," which ended in 1763. And what's 1763 plus twelve? 1775.

Gaston probably purchased eggs from Villeneuve's market every day (remember, there was no refrigeration, so he had no choice but to buy a fresh batch of eggs every day lest they spoil). The purchase of sixty eggs a day from _just one person_ was sure to send Villeneuve's merchants reeling. The supply of eggs was low and the demand high, which must've sent the prices _skyrocketing_. Farmers have to make a living, too!

 

 

 

This site[7] states that in 1695, French eggs cost roughly a third of a pound (which was the French currency until 1794[8]). Using this currency converter[9], I discovered that in 2017 money, that's £42.30 or $54.07. But that's just 1695 - let's find something a little closer to the eighteenth century, shall we?

 

 

According to an American record from Massachusetts[10], a dozen eggs in the eighteenth century cost anywhere from $0.07 (£0.05) to $0.114 (£0.09). I'll be sticking with the 1773 price ($0.056/£0.04), however, as it's closest to our time frame. In 2017 money, that's equivalent to $6.10 or £4.77. That's _crazy_! Today, a dozen eggs cost somewhere around $1.50/£1.34 in America!

So - if Gaston bought five dozen eggs a day, that would be roughly £0.2 pounds sterling (in 1773 money). In 2017 money, that's _$30.5/£23.87/€27.19 a day_ \- and that's without factoring in the fluctuating supply and demand! In Villeneuve, they likely cost _way more than that due to both the floundering economy and Gaston's destruction of the market_.

When the woman in "Belle" sings, _"I need six eggs,"_ and someone replies, _"That's too expensive,"_ THEY WEREN'T KIDDING.

**TL;DR - Gaston was an economist's worst nightmare who doomed the whole town before the Beast was even a thing. Just think: for nearly his entire life, he dragged Villeneuve's businessmen and farmers through the mud and denied the villagers (at least the ones who didn't have chickens of their own) access to a healthy source of protein. No wonder LeFou paid them to sing during "Gaston"!**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1 [BatB Producers Tumblr Dialogue](https://gastvn.tumblr.com/post/161142143137/batb-producers-we-wanted-to-downplay-the) [return to text]
> 
> 2 ["Gaston" Genius Lyrics](https://genius.com/Josh-gad-gaston-lyrics) [return to text]
> 
> 3 Two of my ficlets: ["Morning"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11062140/chapters/24666624) and ["Dessert"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11062140/chapters/24666855) [return to text]
> 
> 4 [How many 16th century French laying hens would be required to feed Gaston his five dozen eggs?](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/61kmto/how_many_16th_century_french_laying_hens_would_be/) [return to text]
> 
> 5 [Mercantilism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercantilism) [return to text]
> 
> 6 [Economic history of France (eighteenth century)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_history_of_France#Eighteenth_century) [return to text]
> 
> 7 [How much was a loaf of bread?](http://www.johnhearfield.com/History/Breadt.htm) [return to text]
> 
> 8 [French livre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_livre) [return to text]
> 
> 9 [Pounds Sterling to Dollars: Historical Conversion of Currency](https://www.uwyo.edu/numimage/currency.htm) [return to text]
> 
> 10 [Prices and Wages by Decade: 1800-1809](http://libraryguides.missouri.edu/pricesandwages/1800-1809) [return to text]


	2. How Many Eggs did Gaston Actually Consume in His Lifetime?

After practically writing an _essay_  on Gaston's destructive diet, I was inspired to write a series of metas that I've dubbed "The Gaston Appendices." For this next one, I'll be once again following the theme of food: I've decided to calculate the grand total of eggs Gaston ate in his life!

First, we'll have to determine what year Gaston was born in. It's been established that both of Disney's "Beauty and the Beast" movies take place in eighteenth century France, and in the 2017 remake, Gaston and LeFou both spoke of fighting in a war. This was most likely the Seven Years' War, which started in 1756 and ended in 1763.

In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, Luke Evans revealed that Gaston was sixteen in the year 1740.[1] This means that he was born in 1724, and by the time the Seven Years' War began, he would've been thirty-two. By the end of the war, he would've been thirty-nine. As Luke Evans is currently thirty-eight, this is hardly a stretch; however, it's likely that he was in his early forties during the movie.

In my last meta, I cited a deleted scene from 2017's remake that revealed it'd been twelve years since the Seven Years' War, placing the movie around 1775. If Gaston was actually born in 1724, that would place him at the age of fifty-one.

No.

Either Luke Evans was incorrect about Gaston's age, or the war he and LeFou fought in wasn't actually the Seven Years' War - it's possible that it was a fictional war! After all, Villeneuve is fictional. Who's to say that the war they fought in wasn't made up by Disney, as well?

For the purposes of this post, however, I'm going to ignore the deleted scene - it _was_ a deleted scene, after all - and just assume that 2017's "Beauty and the Beast" takes place a few years after the Seven Years' War - let's say three! This means that Gaston would be forty-two during the events of the movie. He died in 1766.

Now let's move on to when he first started eating eggs. Nowadays, babies start eating solid foods sometime between four to six months. In the eighteenth century, however, weaning could begin as early as two months.[2] While Gaston was likely eating all solid food at eight months, it's very unlikely that he started consuming copious amounts of eggs until the age of ten.

In "Gaston," Gaston himself sings, _"When I was a lad, I ate four dozen eggs/Every morning to help me get large."_ Let's say that this obsession with becoming fit started around the age of ten. Luke Evans said that at the age of sixteen, Gaston defended Villeneuve from pirates and became something of a hero - he probably considered this his "coming-of-age" rite, the transition from child to man. So starting in 1734, Gaston ate forty-eight eggs every day for six years.

 

 

I did the math (including the leap year, 1736) and double-checked it multiple times. Over six years (assuming that he had eggs for breakfast _every single day without fail_ ), Gaston ate 105,216 eggs.

In the next verse of "Gaston," he sings,  _"And now that I'm grown, I eat five dozen eggs/So I'm roughly the size of a barge!"_ Assuming that he started eating sixty eggs a day in the year 1740 (also a leap year), he then ate five dozen eggs every day for another twenty-six years. Counting the six leap years that took place between 1740 and 1766 (but  _not_ counting 1740 as a leap year, since it was already counted in the last calculation), that's 9,131 ludicrous days of egg consumption.

 

 

That's 547,860 eggs in twenty-six years.

**The grand total is a whopping 653,076 eggs over the course of thirty-two years, eaten from the age of ten to forty-two.**

Of course, he may have eaten the rare egg or two before the age of ten, but I'm guessing that he started obsessively consuming them around that time.

653,076 eggs. Wow.

My, what a guy, right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1 [Luke Evans' backstory for Gaston is a beauty](https://ew.com/movies/2017/03/14/beauty-and-the-beast-luke-evans-gaston-backstory/) [return to text]
> 
> 2 [Weaning through the ages: a parents' guide](http://www.bounty.com/baby-0-to-12-months/weaning/ask-the-experts/weaning-through-the-ages) [return to text]


End file.
